


i defined, i designed, my recovery

by jeanmoreau (laurellance)



Series: jeremyjean fics [1]
Category: All For the Game - Nora Sakavic
Genre: M/M, Recovery
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-09-11
Updated: 2016-09-11
Packaged: 2018-08-14 11:43:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,343
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8012374
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/laurellance/pseuds/jeanmoreau
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean Moreau, after. </p><p>(This is his not-quite recovery.)</p>
            </blockquote>





	i defined, i designed, my recovery

Riko breaks him, that is a truth he know well, because it is a truth that resides in the crevices of his bones, in the reminders of a past he will never be able to forget, and in the almost-recovery that he never truly believes. 

Jean does not go back to France. He never does, even if his French is fluent, and everything about him, the most basic habits, are French by nature. He does not go back, because there is nothing to go back to, nothing that he can remember that had been good and pure and not tainted. He wears his nationality and past innocence as a crown, and a cruel reminder of everything he has lost and never able to find again. 

He does not go back to France. He stays with the Trojans, and they stay with him, long after he graduates. Kindness is something he has not known, and acceptance and forgiveness are foreign, and these are almost-truths he wants to believe, but can’t because Riko has taken it from him, and so he stares again at the number ‘3’ tattooed onto his cheek. 

They are friendly, kind, and they say nothing as he screams at them on court, for why their form isn’t quite right, as he lashes out against Jeremy, and they say nothing. Nothing to indicate punishment, because Jean knows the signs, and they are never there, even when he looks ten, twenty times. Jeremy takes charge of him, more so than the others; it is Jeremy that stays with him at night, as he sobs for reasons unknown, and it is Renee on the phone, who stays with him from 2 AM in the morning to 6, as she listens to him talk. 

He waits for punishment, he always does. From the teasing, the carefree way they practice, and Jean doesn’t quite get it. He never has, because the Ravens had valued victory over everything else, and in it a cruel hierarchy of talent had risen. He is the third most talented, and that is something he will never forget. A trinity, the power of three, a trilogy, and he doesn’t understand them, how they can accept defeat so easily, with a smile and no hard feelings.

(He whispers in French by default, because France is his past, but English, America, is his present.)

* * *

 

Out of laziness, he takes French. It’s almost surreal, having a full pick of his classes, and it takes Jeremy two days to get through to him that no one is forcing his hand, but even then he stares absentmindedly at the paper, because there is no way this is real, this has to be a trick of some sort. 

In the end, Jeremy reads out the classes, and asks him what he wants to choose. This, this he is familiar with. The list is long, but he chooses, based on what Jeremy says, tone cheerful and optimistic. 

The only one of significance is French, and that is easy. Because his first language, not the one he had adopted out of fear, is French, and it reminds him of a time long gone, when everything was well, in it’s own foreign incomprehensible way, where there was only joy. 

English is the language of Ravens, the one he would be forced to use because Riko never understood French, and Riko had always despised what he was unknown to.

(Japanese is the one he cannot stand now, the one that he flinches at every time.)

* * *

 

He doesn't like the Trojans, not really. They're too optimistic, too strange, and their technique is sloppy. 

They don't get upset when they lose. They accept the loss and congratulate the winning team with grace. 

The one award they had won consistently was Best Sportsmanship. He grudgingly has to give merit to that achievement, even if their Exy was disappointingly bad. 

(The last is a secret he never tells anyone, because he is still raised a Raven.)

* * *

 

Somehow, he ends up studying law as a Major. It’s ironic really, because apparently most of the things Riko has done to him fit within that category, and sometimes it’s even funnier when he sees people react to the crueler things. 

He doesn’t tell the professor he knows what Waterboarding feels like, or how long it takes fingers to heal. He doesn’t tell any of it, but stares impassively down to his textbook, as the professor explains it. He corrects the textbook details, because they aren’t nearly as accurate as it was supposed to be. Their assignment is a paper

He calls Renee later that evening. It’s an interesting conversation, because he’s sure at least one of his roommates is within close proximity, and was quite disturbed to hear exactly how Waterboarding went, or how painful it was. 

(He does make a stray comment that the person who did it,  _ Riko _ , is dead later. 

Although, if he’s being honest, it takes him a long time to truly believe it. 

He had watched Riko’s funeral from the nurse Abby’s house. It still does not feel real.)

* * *

 

Jeremy Knox is infuriating. He is a mystery, the kind that Jean had always dismissed as lost potential. 

He is also Jean’s roommate, and the only person who stays with him through the never ending nightmares, and the only person who is truly patient with him. He hears one of the others say more than once that Jeremy is loyal and kind, and he has to agree to that sentiment.

(It is not long before he realises he would follow Jeremy to the deepest pits of the hell, and come back for him every step of the way.)

* * *

 

Occasionally Kevin texts. He never calls, but that is understandable. Jean wouldn’t either.

They’re critiques mostly, of where his teammates have bad form, and he often replies back with even worse examples from practise. Those weren’t even the bad ones, because if he really wanted to show Kevin  _ bad _ , he would show them the practices the day after they had spent all evening and the following day drunk, where he would quite literally walk circles around them. 

Those days were always fun. He would practice with them bumbling around, and then he would stay till dawn beating holes into the walls of the stadium. Jeremy watches, with eyes that gradually look clearer, and he would count. 

The number is never good enough for Jean, but Jeremy always asks him to help. So he does, by showing Jeremy how to improve his accuracy, his form, his technique, and the improvement is better when Jeremy asks him to teach the team the same techniques.

They beat Belmonte easily, and in the later death matches, beat the Ravens. (This is where Jeremy hugs him tightly, eyes proud, and even he can’t deny the thrill of beating them, but he says nothing, and let’s Jeremy and Alveraz conduct the interviews.)

* * *

 

Theadora texts him the next day. It’s not surprising, given her and Kevin’s history, but what is surprising is the subject of the text. 

It asks about him and Jeremy, and about the status of their relationship. 

He tells her they are friends, but even then he isn’t quite sure. Jeremy is his guardian angel, despite every attempt on his side to deny it. 

(He would still follow Jeremy to the end of the earth, if that was what Jeremy had so desired.)

* * *

 

Then, Jeremy kisses him one day. It’s a party the team had hosted, and he watches them get drunk from a distance. He’s always done that, just watched them; but Jeremy, always Jeremy, would drag him out of the corner, and make him participate. 

This time, they are on a couch half soaked with alcohol. And Jeremy leans in, and kisses him. 

He doesn’t resist it, because Jeremy is soft, and he is gentle and it feels right in a way things have never truly felt right, and it’s something he’s working on, but he’s getting there. 

So, he lets Jeremy Knox kiss him, and he returns it. 

**Author's Note:**

> Title comes from James Arthur's Recovery.
> 
> Find me on tumblr at @jeans-moreau :D


End file.
